Full Comment - How China played Canada for a sucker

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00:00:22.160 China's foreign interference isn't new in Canada, especially not if you've been paying attention.

00:00:27.140 Hello and welcome to the Full Common Podcast. My name is Brian Lilly, your host.

00:00:31.300 And today we're going to delve back into an issue that we've touched on many times.

00:00:34.880 It wasn't that long ago that we were speaking with Michelle Junokatsuya about Project Sidewinder

00:00:40.240 and how as early as the 1990s, Canadian politicians had been warned that foreign interference by China was happening.

00:00:47.920 Since then, they've tended to ignore it over and over and over again.

00:00:51.580 And now we've got a public inquiry that's on the go. And my worry is that they are ignoring that.

00:00:59.020 Jonathan Manthorpe is someone who has been paying attention to this issue for quite a while.

00:01:03.480 He is the author of a book named Claws of the Panda, Beijing's Campaign of Influence and Intimidation in Canada.

00:01:09.600 It came out in 2019. I picked it up a couple of years ago, but he's about to release an updated version

00:01:16.340 with everything that's happened over the last five years, which is a lot.

00:01:20.860 Jonathan, thanks for the time. Welcome to the Full Common Podcast.

00:01:24.820 Oh, delighted to be here, Brian.

00:01:26.660 Before we get into your book and the update that's coming out, everything since the arrest of Meng Wanzhou,

00:01:34.860 let's talk about the inquiry. I don't think that the government wants people to pay attention to it.

00:01:42.380 I think they want to downplay it. And I also think that an awful lot of Canadians aren't paying attention to it.

00:01:48.800 But my bet is that you are. What are your thoughts so far?

00:01:52.840 Yeah, well, I'm very disappointed in the inquiry for a number of reasons.

00:01:56.560 One, and the main one, is that I think that it is drawn far too narrowly,

00:02:02.460 which sort of sustains your point about the government not being keen on it.

00:02:08.360 It is looking only, or its mandate is only to look at election interference.

00:02:15.500 Now, election interference is actually a relatively small part of the Chinese Communist Party's interference in Canada.

00:02:24.540 And it may not even, in my view, it's perhaps not even the most important one.

00:02:30.560 So, I mean, that's a downside to begin with.

00:02:33.160 But the thing that really gets my goat, I have to say, and I've been following this story, in fact, since about 1971.

00:02:41.260 What really gets my goat is that the parliamentarians really only got interested in this

00:02:46.900 and started to do anything about it and having not only this public inquiry, but committee inquiries.

00:02:52.640 When they were in the frame, when the whole issue of election interference came up.

00:02:59.060 Now, you know, where you really need to look at the interference by the Chinese Communist Party

00:03:07.620 is in things like our universities, is in business, is in their intimidation of Canadians of Chinese, 0.54

00:03:17.700 Tibetan, and Uyghur heritage here.

00:03:19.820 Now, those people have had a platform in this inquiry, thankfully.

00:03:24.560 But they've been sending heartfelt messages and reports to government about what's happening in their communities

00:03:32.200 for years and years and years.

00:03:34.700 And it's only when their own ox is being gored that the parliamentarians have woken up.

00:03:40.640 But I would say if Canadians can't get upset at China trying to pick our government for us, 0.96

00:03:47.260 they're probably not going to get upset at the rest.

00:03:51.280 And you've written about this in the past.

00:03:53.700 Others have written about it in the past.

00:03:55.260 And as you say, no one paid attention until it was in the electoral realm.

00:03:59.980 And now it's in the electoral realm.

00:04:02.820 And you can see them trying to downplay it by saying, oh, okay, well, in addition to China's interference,

00:04:08.980 what about Russia?

00:04:09.780 What did Russia do?

00:04:11.040 And what about India?

00:04:12.780 And from following the issues, I knew from the beginning that Russia was not interfering in our elections

00:04:19.760 because they don't care.

00:04:20.640 All they want to do is undermine faith in democracy and the Western way of life.

00:04:26.320 India has very specific aims for their interference.

00:04:29.760 They want to make every gurdwara look like a terrorist cell. 0.90

00:04:32.760 They want to paint every Sikh as an extremist.

00:04:36.600 And that's what the Modi government's been doing.

00:04:39.520 I'm told there's been a little bit of attempts at electoral interference.

00:04:43.180 But that's primarily what it was.

00:04:47.080 And the inquiry has at least borne that out.

00:04:49.060 But it's still, as you say, too narrowly drawn.

00:04:55.140 What did you make of the prime minister getting up to testify?

00:04:58.840 I guess it's about two weeks ago now.

00:05:01.500 And he seemed to have, in my view, what I wrote in my columns, was that he had two main objectives.

00:05:08.440 One, say that he didn't know about certain information because he didn't read it.

00:05:14.180 Later said, oh, no, I read everything.

00:05:15.860 And two, to undermine CSIS.

00:05:20.480 And those seemed to be his goals, not actually speaking the truth.

00:05:25.940 No, I'm inclined to agree with you.

00:05:28.780 It was a very carefully crafted performance.

00:05:33.280 And I basically agree with your judgment on it.

00:05:38.180 The relationship with CSIS is a very interesting one.

00:05:43.440 And you've had a program on Sidewinder.

00:05:47.720 And that's a very good example.

00:05:49.820 And I dealt with this at some length in the first edition of the book.

00:05:54.880 It was a very good example of attempts by politicians to minimize what's said to them by intelligence agencies.

00:06:07.140 That report was just junked.

00:06:11.560 But, you know, looking at it then and looking at it now, it was absolutely accurate.

00:06:16.540 Now, it had a few sort of technical flaws, nothing very much.

00:06:20.660 But, you know, as you say, that was back in the 1990s.

00:06:23.640 And also in the 1990s, there was one of the first public papers by a CSIS analyst, Holly Porteous, her name was.

00:06:36.440 And she wrote a paper looking at the way the Chinese Communist Party's main political warfare organization, the United Front Work Department, had been used in the run-up to the handover of Hong Kong.

00:06:52.600 And then she went on from that to set out how the United Front would be used in Canada.

00:06:59.100 And she anticipated that the handover of Hong Kong, China would turn its attention even more fully on Canada than it had been until then.

00:07:10.480 And it was already, you know, the level of infiltration at that point was very high in Canada, in business, in academia, in politics.

00:07:20.640 So, and that was a public paper back in the early, in the mid, late 1990s.

00:07:26.560 So, you know, the CSIS has been banging this drum since it was founded in the mid-1980s.

00:07:35.260 So there is nothing new here.

00:07:39.860 The problem is, as you point out, political will.

00:07:45.320 And what we do not have in this country yet, unlike Australia, unlike the United States, which are also being infiltrated very heavily by the Chinese Communist Party,

00:07:55.360 what we do not have is political will to do anything about it.

00:07:59.760 We have all the tools that we need, but we do not have political will.

00:08:04.020 So, when I speak to Canadians who don't follow politics closely, often you'll get people who just roll their eyes and say,

00:08:14.740 well, why would China be interested in us?

00:08:16.860 We're too small.

00:08:18.040 You say you've been watching this since 1971.

00:08:23.160 That's the year I was born.

00:08:24.920 And I'm not a spring chicken.

00:08:26.360 So, why would China be interested?

00:08:32.180 Because people simply don't believe it.

00:08:35.680 Well, I tell you, well, the answer is very easy.

00:08:38.660 It began in China in the 1940s when the Chinese Communist Party first became aware in any serious way of Canadian missionaries, Canadian diplomats.

00:08:50.300 And they realized that these guys represented an open window into North America.

00:08:57.100 If you couldn't play with the Americans, which was very difficult for the Chinese Communist Party at that time,

00:09:03.720 the Americans were very, very suspicious.

00:09:06.140 But Canada was the window into North America.

00:09:09.980 And the premier of the time, Zhou Enlai, a very charming man, a very subtle man, he realized also that Canada's sort of ambiguous relationship and attitude towards the Americans could be used.

00:09:31.400 You know, we are both envious and also feel rather superior to Americans at the same time.

00:09:37.920 And he realized that this presented a huge opportunity.

00:09:42.100 And so, he put a lot of emphasis on establishing relations with Canadians he found in China.

00:09:51.440 And then in the early 1960s, he dispatched a really very important figure, Paul Lin.

00:09:59.320 He was a committed Chinese nationalist.

00:10:02.460 And in 1949, when the Communists took over in China, he took his family to China, became a very significant player.

00:10:10.940 And in 1962, Zhou Enlai dispatched him back to Canada to set up the network of agents of influence.

00:10:23.680 Lin was an academic.

00:10:26.260 He set up East Asian center at McGill University.

00:10:30.640 And at the same time, he fostered links to the Canadian business world through and helped set up the Canada-China Business Council,

00:10:42.540 which remains absolutely fundamental body for Chinese influence in Canada.

00:10:48.280 He set up links through academia and exchange of students, which allowed Chinese scientists to come to Canadian universities and pinch Canadian technology, 0.99

00:11:02.260 which is still, in my view, one of the most important aspects that is not being looked at really very closely enough.

00:11:09.260 It's interesting that you said McGill University in Montreal, because it was about 20, 25 years ago, I was working as a reporter in Montreal.

00:11:20.040 And I just noticed that there was an obsession among the political class with China.

00:11:26.800 And so many of them would retire from politics and get a job somehow related to China or visit China.

00:11:33.860 And I thought, this is odd.

00:11:36.060 I don't see this in Ontario.

00:11:38.860 You know, I hadn't worked across the country at that point, but I could definitely say I had not seen that in Ontario.

00:11:43.420 And the Montreal business and political class were absolutely fascinated, mesmerized by China.

00:11:51.760 Well, the link on that is the Power Corporation and the Desmarais.

00:11:57.900 They were instrumental in the formation of the Canada-China Business Council.

00:12:04.960 Paul Desmarais was the first president of the Canada-China Business Council.

00:12:08.760 His son, Andre Desmarais, followed him.

00:12:13.640 And the Power Corporation remains the hub of the Canada-China Business Council.

00:12:21.280 Now, through that link, we have had four prime ministers who have worked for the Power Corporation and therefore been central to the Canada-China Business Council.

00:12:32.680 Pierre Trudeau, Brian Mulroney, Paul Martin, Jean Chrétien.

00:12:37.340 All of them, all of them have been, I mean, that's elite capture on a grand scale for Beijing.

00:12:44.480 So, but when you say elite capture, do you believe that they had Canada's best interests at heart, China's best interests?

00:12:56.780 Were they being influenced directly or indirectly?

00:12:59.640 No, I think they were, I mean, if we're talking about those four prime ministers, they all believed or were led to believe that China and business with China, relations with China was a huge opportunity for Canada.

00:13:18.600 But that's just not true.

00:13:19.720 I mean, if you look at the figures that come out of Ottawa and come out of various Canadian institutions these days, they tell a full story about the relationship with China and the potential of that relationship.

00:13:36.440 We can come back in a moment to what the Huawei affair showed, but let's just let's just take some of those those figures.

00:13:44.660 You know, we are told, for example, that China is our second largest trading partner after the United States.

00:13:50.580 And that gets repeated, repeated, repeated, it is not true.

00:13:55.980 The European Union is our second largest trading partner.

00:14:00.300 And by a long chalk, we sell four times, three to four times more to the European Union than we sell to China.

00:14:08.360 We sell about around 5% of our exports go to China every year, five to seven, it varies a bit.

00:14:16.760 A couple of years ago, the Economist magazine, which has a very good research arm called the Intelligence Unit, they did a global ranking of countries based on the importance to their economies of their exports to China.

00:14:32.840 Canada is 47th on the list.

00:14:36.900 We could we could lose our the Chinese market for our exports tomorrow and we'd be over it by the end of next week, quite honestly.

00:14:46.060 It's another example of how the figures.

00:14:49.680 So what you're saying is we import a lot of things from China.

00:14:53.500 We import a lot and a lot of it goes straight in the landfill because a lot of it is total junk.

00:14:58.720 Yeah.

00:14:59.440 But but in terms of in terms of our of our exports, here's here's another example.

00:15:04.120 This is an important one.

00:15:05.200 You'll remember after the Huawei affair got going.

00:15:07.780 Well, apart from kidnapping the two Michaels, China imposed what in fact were were economic sanctions on Canada and stopped importing grains and meats, including pork.

00:15:22.320 Now, some Canadian producers went squirrelly because they said, oh, China is the largest market for for Canadian pork, largest export market for Canadian pork.

00:15:32.840 Well, that is both true and not true.

00:15:36.120 It is true that in terms of weight, in terms of weight, we send more pork to China than any other export market.

00:15:47.720 And it's worth quite a bit.

00:15:49.480 It's worth 500 million a year.

00:15:51.280 But but but in terms of value, it is a fraction only of what we sell to Japan.

00:15:59.720 We sell two and a half.

00:16:01.340 I was going to say the bake.

00:16:03.640 We said the the best bacon in Canada, I'm told it can be found in Japan.

00:16:09.320 Yeah, we sell two and a half times as much in value to Japan as we do to China.

00:16:16.840 1.2, 1.3 billion worth of pork.

00:16:20.800 But that's the way figures get distorted.

00:16:23.280 I mean, I try to avoid using and in the book I've tried always to try and avoid using figures from Canadian sources on China because they can't be trusted.

00:16:34.360 Most of the figures I use are World Bank or OECD or Organization for Economic and Cooperation and Development numbers because they're far more trustworthy.

00:16:43.720 The notion that we have this special relationship with China has been inculcated into the whole of our official business and academic life.

00:16:56.740 And it's it's utter nonsense. 0.81

00:16:58.560 It's utter, utter nonsense.

00:16:59.880 So you said at the beginning that part of why Paul Lin wanted to come here was kind of a foothold into North America to get at the the Americans, not necessarily the American market.

00:17:17.920 Although we saw that during this was one of our trade disputes with the Trump administration.

00:17:24.680 I had to agree with the Trump administration.

00:17:26.680 They were angry over Chinese steel being dumped into the American market because they would send it to Canada.

00:17:36.100 We'd polish it once with a little cloth, ship it down to them, claim it was Canadian. 0.98

00:17:41.120 And and they said, well, wait a minute.

00:17:44.020 They warned us for, I think, 18 months.

00:17:46.640 You have to stop this.

00:17:47.660 We didn't.

00:17:48.460 And then they put tariffs on all of our steel.

00:17:51.860 The Chinese use Canada to get at America, both in terms of trade and influence, don't they? 0.99

00:17:57.780 Yeah.

00:17:58.100 At that time, Paul Lin became known to the Americans as a very dependable mailbox if you wanted to to send letters to Beijing and if you wanted to get replies.

00:18:08.680 He actually I mean, he was living in Montreal, obviously, as a professor at McGill.

00:18:13.920 But he had in his house and I found this in a in a an FBI secret report on him.

00:18:23.260 They he had in his house a telephone which was direct linked to the switchboard in the Chinese embassy in Ottawa.

00:18:31.900 So he was, you know, he was that closely linked to everything.

00:18:36.440 And I found a lot of documents from American businessmen who were trying to get into China ahead of of of diplomatic relations being established.

00:18:50.460 And and Paul Lin was the route they took.

00:18:53.400 So that that was then that was 1969, 70, 71.

00:18:57.440 Um, what about now?

00:19:01.880 Is that still their goal?

00:19:04.680 And why are they interested in I know why they're interested in our business?

00:19:08.360 We'll talk about that in a few minutes.

00:19:09.580 But why would they be interested in in choosing our our government?

00:19:14.260 Why would they be interested in making sure that in the last two elections that Justin Trudeau stay in power?

00:19:20.480 Well, I'm not sure that they did that.

00:19:23.480 I think that that's been a big I think what they are interested in is being able to influence government.

00:19:29.560 And that's and that's slightly different.

00:19:34.820 But and that they have.

00:19:36.640 I mean, you know, the there's still a huge despite the Huawei affair and despite the kidnapping of the two Michaels and all the horrors that were entailed in that.

00:19:45.860 There there are still a lot of officials and politicians in in all levels of Canadian government and say, oh, well, you know, we have to keep contact.

00:19:58.280 We have to maintain relations, so on and so forth.

00:20:02.600 And I'm not sure that we do.

00:20:04.460 I mean, I think the lesson of the of the Huawei of that you cannot have a reasonable, rational relationship with a regime whose first instinct, first instinct when there's a problem is to take hostages.

00:20:18.460 I mean, that just speaks of a cultural cultural gulf, which is unbridgeable for us.

00:20:24.800 Well, I would agree with you on that.

00:20:26.940 However, the current government sees things differently.

00:20:29.760 And our foreign minister, Melanie Jolie, has just dispatched her deputy minister, David Morrison, who is one of these people who apparently fails upwards, as they often do in Ottawa.

00:20:42.940 He was the national security and intelligence advisor for a hot second during all of this, wrote a report that detailed some problems with Chinese election interference, which the prime minister says he didn't read.

00:20:56.380 He missed some of the things that were happening.

00:21:00.880 We know all of this due to the inquiry.

00:21:03.640 And yet he's the deputy minister of foreign affairs and has now been sent over by Jolie.

00:21:08.480 She she sends him on a mission to patch things over with China. 0.73

00:21:13.040 Does that make any sense to you, Jonathan?

00:21:15.420 No, no.

00:21:16.560 I think that for the foreseeable future, we should have a simple transactional relationship.

00:21:23.100 And, you know, you want to buy our wheat?

00:21:26.040 Fine.

00:21:26.400 Send us a check.

00:21:27.280 We'll send you the wheat.

00:21:29.160 As simple as that.

00:21:31.480 You know, let's not forget, you know, all the other stuff in the background.

00:21:36.560 The the repression in Hong Kong.

00:21:39.620 Now, Hong Kong is a Canadian city, for heaven's sake.

00:21:42.340 Well, the Canadians are the largest minority in Hong Kong.

00:21:45.100 And yet, OK, we made a bit of a noise about it when the when the this new national security law was was imposed and they started locking up all the the the pro reform pro political reform activists.

00:22:01.820 And but basically, we've done nothing.

00:22:04.560 And equally, you know, this this is something else that gets my goat.

00:22:09.280 We now have very clear U.N. reports.

00:22:13.920 And this is unusual for the U.N. because China has a huge influence there.

00:22:18.380 We have U.N. reports saying that China uses slave labor in Xinjiang in in in in its production facilities.

00:22:27.980 Now, you know, we quite rightly, quite rightly get very upset about the slavery in in Canada and in North America, you know, over the previous 200 years.

00:22:42.880 And yet we're happily, happily buying junk from China today made by slave labor. 0.99

00:22:49.780 I mean, I find this I find this incomprehensible.

00:22:53.580 And a major consulting firm that may have connections to the government once headed by a Canadian held a conference right near one of those camps.

00:23:05.140 Jonathan, we've we've got to take a break.

00:23:07.280 But when we come back, I want to talk about the the business capture and how that relates to the influence on politicians, because I've got an example from a few years ago that I want to bring up.

00:23:20.200 And I think it still holds true today.

00:23:21.840 Why is there no political will?

00:23:23.760 I think because of the business capture.

00:23:26.020 We'll talk about that when we come back.

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00:25:26.640 Back in 2006, when Stephen Harper was first elected, the new Conservative Prime Minister took a very strong stand on China.

00:25:36.720 Particularly when it came to Hussein Salil, a Chinese Uyghur. 0.84

00:25:42.000 Who was imprisoned.

00:25:44.220 I'm not sure that we could find anyone today.

00:25:47.880 Global Affairs Canada, as it's now called.

00:25:50.700 Who would have anything to say about Hussein Salil.

00:25:55.800 He is a forgotten man.

00:25:58.540 18 years after the fact.

00:26:01.300 And the reason I bring this up is the idea of business capture influencing the political response to China.

00:26:08.260 So Harper took a very strong stand and there was a famous story.

00:26:11.960 He was at an international conference and he had gone to use the restroom.

00:26:19.860 Chinese leader did.

00:26:21.160 He waited outside the restroom to talk to the Chinese leader and say, we want our citizen back.

00:26:26.760 The response from the Canadian media, especially driven by the business media and the business culture in this country was, how dare he do that to a Chinese leader?

00:26:39.760 And why are we putting our business relations at risk for this guy we don't even know?

00:26:45.520 Well, he's a Canadian citizen.

00:26:48.060 You know, that should be enough.

00:26:49.460 It's like, you know, claiming I am a Roman.

00:26:52.440 Well, well, then you get the rights of citizenship.

00:26:56.820 Harper kept his hard line on China for a while until he realized he's just getting beaten up every day by the business culture in this country.

00:27:07.560 And it's not winning him any votes.

00:27:09.240 I've already mentioned the Power Corporation and the Canada-China Business Council.

00:27:13.120 If you look at who the founding companies were in the Canada-China Business Council, it's the elite of Canadian business.

00:27:25.380 It's all the banks, the insurance companies, the investment companies, and major manufacturing companies who moved their manufacturing to China.

00:27:34.940 Now, all those big boys, they got sweetheart deals from the Chinese Communist Party early on.

00:27:41.360 And that has stayed.

00:27:45.680 Those links have stayed.

00:27:48.540 And these, of course, are the companies that can get ministers on the phone.

00:27:55.760 They are the companies that arrange donations to political parties and all this sort of thing.

00:28:03.100 They have influence and they use that influence.

00:28:07.740 If you look at what happened after the two Michaels were kidnapped, a lot of the pressure to try and resolve this and to free Meng Wanzhou came from the business community.

00:28:23.780 And, you know, guys like Jean Chrétien were going around the business community, telling them to put pressure on the Trudeau, Justin Trudeau government to release Meng Wanzhou.

00:28:36.380 That's where a great deal of the influence is.

00:28:39.660 You're quite right.

00:28:40.520 Absolutely.

00:28:42.000 And China looks after that, that clientele of its here very, very well.

00:28:47.800 But, you know, not for the benefit of Canadians.

00:28:51.200 Looking at the founding members on the website, and you're absolutely right.

00:28:56.840 That's who it is.

00:28:59.240 You know, I'm highly critical of the Trudeau government, as most people know.

00:29:03.780 But I had to give them credit, and I did consistently, for not releasing Meng Wanzhou throughout that entire ordeal.

00:29:12.540 That would have sent exactly the wrong signal.

00:29:16.100 And to this day, I give him credit for that.

00:29:20.740 You know, I still think that overall, I believe the prime minister has a soft spot for China.

00:29:28.320 And I'm not just talking about his offhand comment years ago about how he admires their basic dictatorship and allows them to turn green on a dime.

00:29:37.560 Although I do believe he fundamentally holds that view.

00:29:42.580 But is there something – does it go beyond naivete for him?

00:29:48.480 Because there's a longstanding relationship with China and his family.

00:29:52.960 His father, even before he entered politics, had traveled through China, back when it was very difficult for Westerners to travel through China.

00:30:01.940 Do you think that the Trudeau family just has this vision that China is the future?

00:30:07.860 And I don't think that's an idea that's unique to them.

00:30:11.780 But do you think that there is a family connection to this, the way that the current prime minister and current government holds and views China?

00:30:20.720 I think that may well be the case.

00:30:23.540 But I think if you look at why Meng Wanzhou was not released, I think it's – it'd be nice to say, well, you know, Justin Trudeau stood up for the rule of law.

00:30:35.560 I don't think that's what happened at all.

00:30:37.860 If you look at – and I deal with this in the new chapters – if you look at the situation that Canada was in there,

00:30:44.580 we were stuck between China and the U.S., and we had to decide whose team we were on.

00:30:53.500 And with Trump in the White House, there was absolutely no doubt whose team we had to be on.

00:31:01.460 You know, in terms – I mean, I've already talked a bit about our trade relationship.

00:31:05.820 Yeah, the U.S. is by far our most important relationship from any perspective, and not least of trade.

00:31:16.120 And, you know, Trump had already shown that he was prepared to play hardball on the trade side.

00:31:22.600 We had absolutely no choice from a very crude point of view of self-interest but to do it the way Washington wanted it played on that thing.

00:31:34.000 And, you know, it meant putting Canadians at risk, sure.

00:31:39.600 But we had no choice on it.

00:31:42.160 I wish I could say that, you know, we stood up for the rule of law.

00:31:45.600 I don't think we did.

00:31:46.480 We stood up for self-interest in the end.

00:31:50.860 I would like to say that I wish our foreign policy was always decided by self-interest in what's right for Canada.

00:31:58.480 Unfortunately, I don't think that's the case anymore.

00:32:00.700 It's what we'll get us the votes within the various diaspora communities.

00:32:05.980 That seems to be the driving force.

00:32:09.300 Well, it's been like that for a long time.

00:32:11.700 It's just – it appears to be getting worse.

00:32:14.980 It's long been the case.

00:32:17.440 So is China part of the future, though?

00:32:21.300 Do these business elites, the politicians that do this – maybe we should downplay the politicians because, you know, once they retire, they all run off and get a job as a lobbyist for China, and that's cross-party lines.

00:32:36.720 But in terms of the business council that you're talking about and the business elites, and they view China as the future, you seem skeptical of that.

00:32:48.620 I think they're turning away from that.

00:32:50.260 I mean, I've seen some internal papers and talked to people in the power corporation, which, as I've said, is the moving force behind the Canada-China Business Council.

00:33:01.820 And they, a few years ago, began to turn away from China quite significantly and turn towards Europe.

00:33:06.800 They see Europe as the future now.

00:33:08.820 And I think they're right.

00:33:09.760 China has some really serious internal structural economic problems, not least of which is that the Chinese Communist Party will not countenance any kind of political reform.

00:33:26.440 In fact, it is now by far, by far, the most technologically sophisticated totalitarian state the world has ever seen.

00:33:35.780 I mean, it is quite extreme.

00:33:37.060 And they've gone backwards.

00:33:38.420 Absolutely, absolutely backwards under Xi Jinping.

00:33:43.680 And so I don't think, and we're also, of course, you know, we're getting now a real security head-to-head in the Pacific Ocean.

00:33:56.160 The Americans are now butting chests with Beijing. 0.77

00:34:01.160 Beijing has shown that it is keen on imperial expansion.

00:34:05.400 It is, it seems intent on trying to take Taiwan one way or another. 0.80

00:34:11.820 It is these, the Belt and Road Initiative has given it outposts all over the Indian Ocean and Africa.

00:34:21.000 It, it, it, it, it, it, it, it definitely has.

00:34:25.340 And our money is helping invest in that through the Asian Infrastructure Bank.

00:34:29.560 Well, sure.

00:34:30.140 We should have pulled out of that.

00:34:31.860 We should have pulled our money out of that.

00:34:33.840 And I hope we, we, we, we will do so.

00:34:35.840 We should never have got involved in it to begin with.

00:34:37.820 I mean, it was quite clearly a propaganda operation to start with.

00:34:43.020 And, and the, the accounting and the accounting rules and regulations were abysmal.

00:34:49.420 I mean, it was, it was, it was clearly a, a, a, a, a, a briber's, you know, bank.

00:34:58.080 It was, it was designed entirely to, to, to capture, the elite capture in Africa and Asia.

00:35:06.100 And, and that's, that's what it's proved.

00:35:07.960 No, we should never have got involved in that to begin with.

00:35:09.840 Before we get into the, the academic side and why we need to be worried about that, you know, China is also politically aligning with Russia, with Iran.

00:35:24.400 This is the new axis of evil, if you will, that is, is sowing chaos around the world.

00:35:32.560 Yep, absolutely.

00:35:33.360 I mean, I don't, I don't understand why the, the, the self-delusion slides in Ottawa and in other places amongst politicians and officials that somehow there is a, there is a, a, a, a, a residual friendship between our regimes, between our government. 0.98

00:35:55.700 The Chinese Communist Party saw us as useful idiots and they've milked it for all it's worth. 0.99

00:36:03.360 But, you know, just a, an interesting aside on the, how effective they can be at changing people's views or changing language, changing narrative. 0.98

00:36:17.640 The current iteration of the Conservative Party.

00:36:20.480 So under Aaron O'Toole, they took a hard line.

00:36:23.640 They believe they lost votes and seats over that.

00:36:27.300 Aaron O'Toole testified at the inquiry, believes they lost nine seats.

00:36:31.020 But the current Conservative leader doesn't talk about China.

00:36:34.260 He talks about Beijing.

00:36:36.320 And, and he, he's constantly trying to make that, that differentiation that it's the government.

00:36:41.780 And, and I don't think it's because he's trying to be politically correct.

00:36:44.740 He doesn't want to lose the votes in the next election.

00:36:46.880 He doesn't want to give Beijing any reason to tell the Chinese diaspora community through their very Beijing-controlled social, Chinese-language social media,

00:36:57.020 this guy's out to get you.

00:36:58.780 They'll do it anyway.

00:37:00.360 But it, it, it, it is interesting how it changes the language.

00:37:04.540 So I, I wonder how it changes the research, the language, the, what is produced in our academic institutions when Beijing is so heavy. 0.95

00:37:15.900 You know, there's a lot of talks since October 7th and the attack on Israel by Hamas and the fact that they were funded by Qatar about how much money has gone into American institutions from Qatar.

00:37:27.580 That buys influence.

00:37:29.040 That buys changes.

00:37:30.440 Here we've had China for years doing this. 0.99

00:37:33.660 There were attempts to at least get Huawei out of some of this because there was a feeling that Huawei was just stealing intellectual property.

00:37:44.920 How big of an issue was this and has it been curtailed at all?

00:37:50.220 Not so far as I've seen.

00:37:52.360 This started at the very beginning after diplomatic relations were established in 1970 and we started having student exchanges.

00:37:59.860 And I, in the first edition of the book, I mean, I've got a lot of figures on that.

00:38:05.360 The, the, when, when China started sending students over here, they all went and did technical subjects.

00:38:13.200 And Canada applauded this because they thought it would be a nice, you know, part of, of China's remodeling, reestablishment of its economy and the construction of its economy.

00:38:25.640 You know, the, the, the Canadians who went to China were all Maoists who went to study the, you know, the cultural revolution and so on and so on and, and continue to be, you know, and I mean, they were known as Paul Lin's Maoists.

00:38:39.980 Yeah, they were, so, and that has continued and the infiltration of Canadian universities by the Chinese Communist Party has become more and more sophisticated over the years.

00:38:54.040 To the extent, of course, that they actually have spy, spy operations in most of the universities where, where there are Chinese students.

00:39:06.360 The, what has happened most recently is that the, with the, the modernization of the People's Liberation Army, the, the, the, the Chinese military, they have been off stealing military technology wherever they can find it.

00:39:22.140 And Canada is one of the major destinations that they, the, the, the People's Liberation Army scientists come to, to either steal or develop with Canadian help military technology.

00:39:36.600 The, the.

00:39:38.140 Or, or say our biolab in Winnipeg.

00:39:41.960 Well, there's that as well.

00:39:42.880 That's part of it.

00:39:43.760 That's part of it.

00:39:44.920 That, that, and I'm sure that's part of the, the updated book.

00:39:48.580 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:39:49.460 I, you know, it's in there, but, you know, one of the big universities that are targeted by the People's Liberation Army scientists, who, who, by the way, all cover their backgrounds, so it's very hard to identify them as PLA, is Waterloo is one of the big ones.

00:40:07.740 It's, it's, it, it, it, it ranks amongst one of the top universities in the world as a destination for, for People's Liberation Army scientists.

00:40:15.800 But there's also McGill, the University of Toronto, Western, UBC.

00:40:21.700 These are all targets for.

00:40:24.080 I, I, I am sitting right now just steps from the University of Toronto campus.

00:40:30.840 I live downtown, um, and the, the, the change in population, uh, when the school season starts, it's massive Chinese, uh, foreign students coming in.

00:40:44.020 Uh, and it has been for the, the entire time I, I, I've lived here, um, are, are, are most of those students, do you think, uh, you know, is, is, is it beyond sending people over to steal technical secrets now?

00:40:58.300 I mean, there's thousands and thousands of them just here at U of T.

00:41:01.220 Well, and of course, to remember, these, uh, students, uh, are no longer the largest contingent in Canadian universities.

00:41:08.120 Indian students are now.

00:41:09.680 Um, but I mean, if you have, you have to go back about 20, 30 years on this, when, um, various levels of government, um, shrank away from, um, funding, uh, um, uh, necessary assets at Canadian universities.

00:41:28.640 And they said to the Canadian universities, just take in more foreign students, charge them three or four times what you'd charge, um, uh, uh, domestic students, um, and use the money for all these, uh, you know, extra halls and assets that you want to build.

00:41:44.080 Um, and of course, at the same time, um, Canada has quietly and without really any public discussion made foreign students an essential part of our immigration policy.

00:41:58.640 Because they all get, um, the, the opportunity for, um, for, um, permanent residency.

00:42:06.640 Um, which it's the Canadian experience program.

00:42:10.680 Yes.

00:42:11.100 I mean, I remember in South Africa, uh, around the time of the end of the apartheid, Canada advertising in the local newspapers there for South African doctors.

00:42:21.280 Now we know how successful that was.

00:42:23.980 We robbed South Africa of every ruddy doctor we can get on the planes. 0.99

00:42:28.740 And I think that this pillaging of the brightest and best from developing countries is quite frankly immoral.

00:42:36.400 Um, it's, it's, it's, it's, I mean, okay, we get good standard of educated, of educated, uh, young immigrants.

00:42:44.900 But, uh, but at the same time, we robbing their countries of, of intellectual assets, which their countries need.

00:42:53.000 I, I find it quite disgusting myself, but, but I, I, I'm surprised that there isn't more public discussion and public questioning of this use of, of, uh, the foreign students as an essential part of our immigration policy.

00:43:06.260 Uh, it's bizarre and an essential part of keeping the, uh, the universities open.

00:43:11.320 Uh, give us a quick, uh, plug for your book, uh, Jonathan.

00:43:14.640 Uh, so, you know, I've got the 2019 edition, but the 2024 edition comes out.

00:43:20.020 You said when June is it?

00:43:21.660 No, the, the new edition comes out the first week in May.

00:43:25.180 It's, it's a Star Wars book, Star Wars book.

00:43:28.760 May the fourth be with me.

00:43:29.920 Uh, it's, uh, uh, no, it's, uh, it's five new chapters.

00:43:35.700 It, it shows an absolutely radical change in Canada's attitude towards China, at least amongst ordinary Canadians.

00:43:45.140 The, you know, the, the polls show that, uh, that, uh, while the, uh, Canadians as a whole had a pretty, uh, uh, benign view of, of, um, of, uh, the People's Republic of China up to the moment when Meng Wanzhou was detained.

00:43:59.120 And then the two Michaels were kidnapped, uh, Canadian public opinion has turned dramatically, uh, against, uh, the People's Republic of China since then.

00:44:08.360 And, and, and maintains that, that position.

00:44:12.600 I mean, we, uh, uh, the, the politicians are, uh, uh, uh, they're not even running to catch up.

00:44:20.100 They are so far removed from the, the, uh, the attitude of, of, uh, of, of the bulk of Canadians towards the regime in Beijing.

00:44:29.120 It's quite astonishing.

00:44:30.880 Yeah.

00:44:31.740 So that gives me something else to ask you about.

00:44:34.140 And then I promise I'll let you go.

00:44:35.660 Uh, in the United States, it used to be a bipartisan consensus that China was the future.

00:44:41.280 It was Bill Clinton that brought the China into the World Trade Organization.

00:44:45.460 Um, George W. Bush kept, you know, relations going, wanted to expand them.

00:44:51.020 Uh, and, and now it's a bipartisan, bipartisan consensus that China is a very much a problem for Western democracies, for the health of the economy.

00:45:03.360 We don't have that here.

00:45:04.580 We've got one party saying it's a problem, and we've got three others, four if you count the Greens, but, you know, there's only two of them, um, saying, oh, no, oh, no, China is still the future.

00:45:17.700 Why are our politicians so far behind the public?

00:45:20.260 Well, I mean, I, we are not very good at bipartisan, um, approaches.

00:45:26.740 I mean, I, a huge contrast with Australia on this.

00:45:29.740 Australia manages to have a bipartisan foreign policy, bipartisan defense policy.

00:45:36.000 We don't.

00:45:36.660 We have a situation where as soon as you get a change of government, the first thing they do is cancel all the defense contracts that, uh, were, were, uh, introduced by the previous government.

00:45:46.200 Um, and, uh, and there's no consensus on foreign policy.

00:45:50.660 I mean, I, I had hoped that, that, you know, that the, the rigors of, of COVID-19 would lead to a reassessment of our national interests and, um, our national security.

00:46:04.760 But it hasn't happened.

00:46:06.160 And, you know, we're, we're dithering again.

00:46:08.180 We are a nation of ditherers sometimes.

00:46:11.120 And, and we, we, we, we just won't look the truth in the face sometimes.

00:46:17.240 And it's really is, I find it very annoying.

00:46:20.280 And it's very dangerous because it makes us, it makes us an easy victim for a single-minded, um, government or regime like Beijing.

00:46:29.980 We, we, we, we're, we're just sitting there waiting to be plucked.

00:46:33.280 Jonathan, thanks so much for the time.

00:46:37.680 My pleasure.

00:46:39.380 Claws of the Panda, the update edition comes out May the 4th.

00:46:42.960 May the 4th be with you, Jonathan.

00:46:44.400 Uh, do check the book out.

00:46:46.500 Fantastic.

00:46:47.060 Like, the original edition was fantastic in detailing what had already happened.

00:46:51.640 This gives you the next five years.

00:46:53.460 So, do check it out.

00:46:55.000 Full Comment is a post-media podcast.

00:46:57.300 My name is Brian Lilly, your host.

00:46:58.960 This episode was produced by Andre Prune.

00:47:01.100 Theme music by Bryce Hall.

00:47:02.640 Kevin Libin is the executive producer.

00:47:04.960 You can subscribe to Full Comment on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, the new Yahoo, or, sorry, Yahoo, I'm dating myself, YouTube Podcasts.

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00:47:17.560 Help us out by giving us a rating or leaving a review and telling your friends about us.

00:47:22.000 Thanks for listening.

00:47:22.920 Until next time, I'm Brian Lilly.

00:47:24.380 We'll be right back.

Full Comment - April 29, 2024

How China played Canada for a sucker

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